Cargo handling solutions provider Kalmar has signed a joint development agreement with autonomous driving technology start-up Coast Autonomous to speed up the development and launch of mobile robotic solutions.
Kalmar will also become a minority shareholder in the California-based company, which has developed a proprietary autonomous vehicle system that includes mapping and localisation, robotics and AI, fleet management and supervision.
In the initial phase, the partnership between Kalmar and Coast Autonomous will focus on the autonomous driving functionality of the Kalmar RoboTractor – an autonomous terminal tractor shown in the below video – which was launched in December as part of Kalmar’s flexible robotic mobile equipment portfolio.
Lasse Eriksson, vice president, technology at Kalmar, said: “Partnership between Kalmar and Coast Autonomous highlights the importance of collaboration in our industry, especially in the area of robotics.
“Coast’s unique technology that addresses safety on each level and the broad experience in autonomous driving solutions provides us with a great opportunity to accelerate the robotisation journey and the launch of Kalmar Robotic Portfolio.
“As safety is the key criteria in everything we do at Kalmar, we are excited about the collaboration with Coast and the opportunity to integrate their safe autonomous driving solutions that will enable autonomous operation in mixed-traffic environments in the future.”
